A women's wear or ladies wear buyer may have one of
the more difficult jobs in the fashion apparel buying industry. Why would
Apparel Search make such a claim? Because women do most of the household
purchasing and budgeting, and in general, if they are going to allocate time
or money for themselves, it will only be on quality, well-made items that
will not fade with a few launderings or a few months of changing fashion
dictates.

In order to be successful in this position, the ideal
candidate will already have experience in ladies wear. Ideally, this would
include recent experience in buying a mix of casual items (woven/knits, or
jerseys) and dressier women's wear. If you have at least three years
experience with purchasing women's pants, shorts, dresses, or blouses, it
will greatly benefit your company. Alternately, a junior buyer or a senior
buyer (outside of women's wear) who is eager to accept a new challenge could
also find herself excelling as a women's wear buyer. Some companies will
even be willing to consider any women's clothing background for the
purchasing position, as long as your skills include strong management
acumen.

You must also possess outstanding communication and
relationship-building skills. You will be required to build relationships
internally. These include relationships with the other members of your
buying team, and with the principals in other teams, with whom you will work
at various stages in the buying process, in order to bring your company
maximum profits. You will also communicate extensively with suppliers
outside of your company.

The coin has two sides; to be successful as a women's
wear buyer, you have to be comfortable with autonomy, but must also function
beautifully within a team environment. As the senior buyer, you will
probably find yourself managing a team of at least two assistant buyers,
plus a buyers administrator. Their training, needs, and skill levels will
vary, and your patience, flexibility, and communication will be tested.

Any successful women's wear buyer (in fact, any senior
buyer in the fashion industry) is clothed with negotiation skills of the
highest quality. Your negotiation skills must be well-developed, as you
will need to pull out all the communication and relationship-building stops
when dealing with suppliers. It is your job to make sure that orders are
accurate and delivered on time. And that must be arranged with the
suppliers.

You will also find yourself working consistently with
the merchandising team of your company. The buying team and merchandising
teams work together on pre-season orders and in-season repeat orders. They
work together to create pricing and promotional strategies that will, in
turn, create the highest profit margins for the company.

ApparelSearch.com can not stress enough that a women's
wear buyer must know their rapidly changing market. You will be called upon
daily to think on your feet and make quick decisions. These should be
informed decisions. If you can translate numerical data into practical and
profitable decisions, it will ultimately increase sales margins for clients
within their women's wear departments, and profit margins for your company.

How do you increase profit margins? By sourcing
products that compete in both the fashion and financial realms. You can do
the latter because you are an informed women's wear buyer who stays on top
of market research. You do the former by consistently going into the market
to find new product. Most companies seeking ladieswear buyers prefer
that potential candidates for the position have already gained direct
experience in sourcing with companies from the Far East. You will also find
yourself at trade shows and other events. Your technical eye will help you
build solid product and category ranges for your company and your clients.

Welcome to the womenswear buyer job
description section of the Apparel Search employment
directory. In this section of our guide we present
information relevant to a career as a womenswear buyer.
Although for many of our
career descriptions we provide
information that we have developed internally, a large
portion of this
section relies heavily on user input. No one knows a
career path better than someone that has actually worked
in the particular position. Therefore, we welcome
members of the fashion community to submit their
personal experience to this page. Active members
of the
fashion industry are welcome to contribute to the
job descriptions by using the comment area below.

If you
have previously or currently work as a womenswear
buyer please add your insight
to the community discussion. Educators such as
fashion school teachers and
knowledgeable garment industry veterans are also welcome to
comment. Let's all work together to help educate
the world about various
fashion careers.
More specifically, let's education regarding this
particular career path.

Please only post educational
information or questions specifically relevant to the job of a
womenswear buyer.